Nicoletta tucked Sophie beneath the coverlet the child had restlessly kicked off herself. She coaxed the child to drink the medicine-laced water, smiling when the little girl clutched her hand. "Perhaps it would be best to continue this conversation when we are alone," she advised quietly. She leaned back and closed her eyes tiredly. Her calf was sore, burning and throbbing, already swelling. If she hadn't been so tired, she would have mixed a potion for herself. But first she wanted to sleep; and then she wanted to leave the palazzo and get back to her own world, where she could breathe more easily.
"Nicoletta, the don is dangerous," Maria Pia announced softly. "You have too much compassion in you. You are very young. There is something wrong in this house. I do not like the way he looked at you."
Nicoletta smiled without opening her eyes. "Ti voglio bene." She affectionately told the older woman she loved her. "Do not worry for me. You have done so all my life. I will not see the don again. I love living, Maria Pia. I do not want to be burned as a witch." She was smiling, reassuring the woman, but inside she was trembling. The don frightened her in a way no one ever had before, in a way she could not explain to Maria Pia or even to herself.
The older woman hissed, looking quickly into every corner of the room, frightened by Nicoletta's audacity.
"Hush, bambina, you cannot speak of such things. Not ever. The good Virgin will not protect you if you call down such unspeakable evil upon yourself."
"The little one is asleep; there is no one to hear." Nicoletta was unrepentant.
"There are eyes and ears everywhere. This house is not right," Maria Pia reminded her sharply, glancing uneasily around the silent nursery. An abrupt knocking broke the hush. Maria Pia gave a frightened cry as the door swung inward.
The manservant slunk in carrying a load of wood for the fire. He didn't look at the women, his features stiff and set. He built a nest of curls of shaved wood, added the logs, and set the whole thing blazing. When the flames crackled to life, the man turned and regarded the "healer" and her "assistant" with a cold stare. "Your fire, as ordered," he said grudgingly. As much as he evidently wished the women gone, the healer was respected and needed in the community, and he didn't dare alienate her completely. He turned on his heel and marched out, his back ramrod stiff.
"We are not making many friends here," Nicoletta observed with a small smile. "Do you suppose they waited so long to send for us in hopes it would be too late to save the bambina?"
"Nicoletta!" Maria Pia was shocked, her gaze wildly searching the room as if she expected to see the don standing there listening. "I forbid anymore of this talk."
Nicoletta was happy enough to go to sleep. The child was warm in her arms, and with the fire crackling nicely, the room seemed much more pleasant. She snuggled down onto the bed and lay quietly. Within a matter of minutes, Maria Pia was breathing evenly, indicating she had immediately fallen asleep. Nicoletta was very tired, but she couldn't follow suit. Too many unanswered questions whirled in her head.
She was "different." She had been born with unique abilities. Maria Pia called them gifts, yet she had to hide them for fear of being named witch. She could touch an individual and "feel" the illness. She knew instinctively which herbs or potions sick people needed to alleviate their suffering and aid their healing. She could even communicate with plants. She "felt" the life in them and knew what they needed to assist their growth.
Nicoletta could also aid in curing the ill with her soothing hands and voice. From deep within her welled a healing warmth that flowed from her body into that of her patient. Maria Pia, devout as she was, would never actually call her a witch. She would never imply in any way that Nicoletta was capable of magic. She never pointed out that Nicoletta came from a long line of "unique" women and that more than one of her ancestors had been burned at the stake, stoned, or deliberately drowned. Maria Pia guarded her carefully and maintained the role of the "healer," keeping the attention on herself rather than Nicoletta.
The villagers, too, knew that Nicoletta was different, and they aided Maria Pia in deceiving the aristocrazia, keeping Nicoletta far from the palazzo and all who occupied it. They guarded her like a treasure, and she was very grateful to them. But now...
Nicoletta sighed. She went carefully over everything that had happened since her arrival at the palazzo. She certainly had caught the attention of the don. A shiver raced down her spine. Was it from fear? Or something else? Nicoletta was honest enough to admit that Don Scarletti was an incredibly handsome man. And power seemed to cling to him. She couldn't imagine trying to defeat such a man. His dark eyes were piercing and seemed to see right past flesh and bone into her soul. She shivered again and decided what she had felt was fear.
He had looked at her with interest stirring in the depths of his eyes. No one had ever looked at her the way Don Giovanni Scarletti had. He was no callow youth but a grown man, a nobleman at that, rumored to head a secret society of assassins. Others in power either left him strictly alone or vied for his attention, coveting his loyalty. But more than all of that, his family was cursed. No village woman, nor even many Scarletti wives, had survived long in the Palazzo delta Morte--Palace of Death. And he had looked at her, marking her as prey. The thought crept unbidden into her fanciful mind.
A log in the fireplace burned through and collapsed in a shower of sparks, flames flaring momentarily to cast an image of hell on the wall. Nicoletta's breath caught in her throat as the heavy door swung slowly inward. A man hesitated in the entrance.
Nicoletta didn't believe in cowering beneath the covers. "Signore?" She managed to keep her voice even, in spite of trembling uncontrollably. "What is it?"
"Scusa, signorina, I did not mean to disturb you. I wanted to see my daughter." Despite the natural arrogance in his tone, he was extremely polite for an aristocratic. This was Vincente, the youngest of the three Scarletti brothers. He had the same muscular build and confidence of his older brothers, as befitted one born to nobility, but the similarities ended there. Where Don Giovanni Scarletti had a palpable aura of power and danger and authority about him, this man seemed ravaged by sorrow, almost as if he couldn't stand straight beneath the weight of his burden. His young wife, Nicoletta seemed to recall, was one of the casualties of the Scarletti curse, leaving him a widower with no mother for his child.
Immediately Nicoletta's heart went out to him, her compassionate nature sharing his sorrow. Normally she would never speak directly to a member of the Scarletti family--it was as natural to her as breathing to avoid contact with nobility and outsiders--but she couldn't help responding to him. "There is no need to worry, signore, the bambino will live. The soup she shared with Don Scarletti was tainted. She was given medicine to aid in her healing." Her voice was soft and soothing, unconsciously reaching out to "heal" him, too, as she so often did with her people.
He bowed, a courtly gesture of respect. "I am Vincente Scarletti. The bambino is all I have left in this world. When I saw the bedchamber below empty, I..." He trailed off. "I do not know how I thought to check the nursery. I was numb and walked here blankly, without thought."
No wonder sorrow was etched so deeply into his face. Nicoletta reassured him. "A small incidente, no more, Signore Scarletti."
"I thank you for saving the don and my daughter. I do not know what our famiglia would do without mio fratello, the don. And the bambina is everything to me."
"Maria Pia Sigmora is a healer without equal," Nicoletta lied, straight-faced. She was grateful for the shadows in the room that prevented the man from examining her too closely. His brother's scrutiny had been enough adventure for one night.
"Vincente! What is going on? Has Sophie taken a turn for the worse?" The woman, Portia Scarletti, who had been weeping earlier in the hallway, poked her head into the room, wrapping her hand familiarly around Vincente's arm. Her face mirrored her deep concern.
Nicoletta studied her closely. Portia looked far younger than what must be her thirty or so years. Margerita, her daughter
, appeared to be at least fifteen. Portia wore a long, form-fitting gown that revealed more than it covered, and even in the middle of the night, her hair was dressed perfectly.
Portia took in the women and child in the room with one swift glance. "Ah"--she crossed herself devoutly--"thank the Madonna, the bambina is well. Come, Vincente, you have suffered much. You must rest."
"Have you both gone mad?" The voice from the doorway was low but carried a whiplash in it, a hard authority no one would dare to defy. "Sophie nearly died tonight, these women are exhausted with the work they have done, and you do not give them even the courtesy of allowing them to sleep undisturbed?" Don Scarletti moved into the room, his presence immediately dominating the nursery and those who occupied it. "Portia, you and Margerita were too afraid to see to the needs of the bambina when she needed you, yet now, in the middle of the night, you enter the room to awaken her caretakers?"
The woman winced under the reprimand. "How can you accuse me of such a thing? I was seeing first to Margerita's safety, as a mother should. The servants were to see to the bambina. I ordered them to do so, but they refused, thinking they might encounter the plague. I cannot control the superstitious beliefs of those from the villaggi. They do not listen when they fear the unknown. Surely you do not blame me for their incompetence!"
"I found the poor piccola abandoned, with waste and vomit all over her." The obsidian eyes were lethal. He didn't raise his voice, but he was cutting the woman to pieces, and Nicoletta almost felt sorry for her.
"I gave the orders to the servants." Portia lifted her chin. "How dare you chastise me in front of ones such as these?" She waved a hand to encompass Nicoletta and the sleeping Maria Pia. "Vincente, please, escort me to my room."
Vincente obligingly took the woman's hand and tucked it into the crook of his arm. "Grazie, for the life of my bambina" he said sincerely, bowing to Nicoletta in a courtly manner.
"I am grateful at least one of you knows to whom we owe a debt of thanks," Don Scarletti said softly. His voice fairly purred with menace, a velvet lash masking an iron will. Nicoletta found herself trembling for no reason at all. She suddenly didn't want the others to leave the room. Worse, she knew by Maria Pia's breathing that she wasn't faking but was still truly asleep. Nicoletta would find no savior there if Don Scarletti turned the full power of his soul-piercing eyes on her once again.
Portia now remained silent against the don's accusation, and that told Nicoletta much about the household. Its members feared him nearly as much as she did. There was something cold and aloof about the don. Something in him held away from the others, seemingly relaxed yet coiled and ready to strike like a snake. His family treated him with tremendous deference, as if they, too, sensed he was dangerous.
Nicoletta allowed her long lashes to drift down as Vincente took Portia Scarletti from the room. She held herself very still, not daring to move a muscle. Silence stretched out so long, she wanted to scream. There wasn't a sound, not the rustling of clothes or a hint of movement. Not knowing what the don was doing was worse than facing him. She lay there with her heart pounding, hardly breathing. Waiting. Listening. There was no sound.
Nicoletta began to relax. No one could be that quiet. She sighed with relief. He must have followed the others out of the room. Snuggling deeper into the coverlet, she took a chance and peeked. He was standing over her, as still as the mountains, waiting, his dark eyes fixed on her face. He had known all along that she wasn't asleep and that she would eventually look. For a moment she couldn't breathe, trapped in the intensity of his black gaze. The flames from the hearth seemed to be reflected there, or perhaps it was the volcano seething inside him, deep, hot, and dangerous.
"I am not fooled so easily as you and the old woman might think." He said it quietly, a soft, ominous statement of fact. Indeed, the words were so soft, she wasn't certain he had actually murmured them. He turned with his peculiar flowing grace and left the room, closing the door behind him with finality.
Chapter Three
"Nicoletta! You left your shoes by the stream again." The childish voice was giggling, bubbling over with laughter. "Maria Pia said to watch you. You left your real sandals at the palazzo. She said--"
"You are never going to let me forget that, are you, Ketsia," Nicoletta interrupted, laughing. She placed a garland of flowers on the little girl's head. "I cannot believe she told everyone. That was so mean!" But her dark eyes were dancing with shared merriment.
Ketsia giggled again. "You are so funny, Nicoletta." The little girl danced around, spinning in circles, her arms held out wide to embrace the crisp mountain air. Wild flowers exploded in a riot of color, and overhead, birds sang out, each attempting to outdo the other with trilling melodies.
Nicoletta whirled and swayed beside Ketsia, her wide skirts flaring, her long hair flying in all directions, her bare feet tapping out a rhythm in the grasses. She began to sing softly, her voice melodious as she danced, limping just a little. Her leg was still sore, but the swelling had gone down. She bathed it daily in the cold stream, applying poultices to speed the healing.
It had been several days since she had been called to the palazzo. The memory of the don hadn't faded at all. Instead, she found herself uneasy, often thinking of him. At night she dreamed of him. A tall, solitary man with dark, hypnotic eyes. He whispered to her, called to her, his soft voice insistent, aching. She dreamed erotic dreams, things she knew nothing about; she dreamed of love and death. Lately, the only time she had felt at peace was when she was far from the village, surrounded by the peace of the mountains. Young Ketsia often accompanied her into the hills while the girl's mother worked at her weaving. The villagio women were renowned for the weaving of beautiful cloth, much in demand by the aristocrazia and surrounding settlements.
When the wild dance was ended, the pair collapsed together, laughing at their silliness, Ketsia putting an arm around Nicoletta. "I love to be with you," she admitted in the guileless way of children.
"I am so glad, Ketsia, because I love spending time with you." Nicoletta had been mixing flower petals together in an attempt to come up with a new dye for the cloth of the village. The weavers depended on her experiments to produce things unique enough to please those in the palazzo and to barter in the neighboring towns. Ketsia proved helpful in gathering the flowers for her. The child liked being the assistant, remembering where Nicoletta had left her shoes and seeing to it that she remembered to eat the bread and cheese she carried but often forgot.
"Cristano was looking at you again, Nicoletta," Ketsia pointed out slyly.
Nicoletta shrugged her slender shoulders. "Though he vows to wed me one day, I do not have the shape he is looking for. He has told me my waist is too small, as are my hips. I would not make buoni bambini."
Ketsia was outraged. "He said that to you?"
Nicoletta nodded, hiding her smile at the child's indignation. "Yes, he did, and he also said I was too wild and he would insist on taming me and making me cover my hair and wear shoes at all times. Now, in truth, Ketsia, should I even consider marrying a man who would expect me to remember where my shoes are?"
Ketsia thought about it solemnly. "Cristano is very handsome, Nicoletta. And I think he likes you very much. He is always looking at you when he thinks you are not aware of it."
"He is handsome," Nicoletta conceded, "but it is more important that a man likes a woman as a person, Ketsia. And I should like him as a person, not just how he looks. Cristano will make some girl a good husband, but not me. He will want me to cook and clean for him and stay all day inside. I would wither and die. I belong here." Nicoletta spread her arms wide to encompass the mountains. "I shall not marry but stay free to do what I was born to do."
The little girl looked up at her, puzzled. "You do not want to have bambini and a husband, a famiglia?" she asked. "You will be all alone."
"I will not be alone, Ketsia. Do not look so sad," Nicoletta assured her, affectionately ruffling her hair. "I will always have you an
d your children, and Maria Pia, and your mother, and all the others in the villaggio. You all are my famiglia. I have all of you and my plants and the outdoors. I could not ask for anything else to make me happy."
The wind rustled, a mere whisper of sound, but Nicoletta instantly spun around. "Where did you say my shoes were?" She looked around the ground strewn with flowers of every description, pushing a hand through her hair in agitation. "Subito, Ketsia, we must find them at once."
Ketsia laughed again, the childish sound joyful. "Maria Pia is coming up the trail," she guessed sagely. No one else could get Nicoletta to be concerned over her lack of footwear. Her present shoes didn't even fit properly. Ketsia's mother had donated an old, worn pair to Nicoletta when she returned shoeless from the palazzo. Ketsia didn't question that Nicoletta sensed Maria Pia nearing them; Nicoletta knew things others did not, though no one spoke of it. When she had tried to tell her mother of the wondrous things Nicoletta could do, her mother shushed her severely.
"Yes, you little imp, it is Maria Pia coming. Now where along the stream are those shoes?" Nicoletta was torn between desperation and laughter. If Maria Pia caught her barefoot again after the incident at the palazzo, which everyone thought terribly amusing, Nicoletta was certain to get a long lecture on growing up and becoming a lady.
Ketsia quickly ran downstream several paces and snatched up the footwear just as Maria Pia came into view down on the trail. The older woman stopped to catch her breath, waiting for them to come to her, clearly out of breath, as if she had been hurrying to reach them.